OUTLINE FOR SPRING 2008
This outline contains most of the material that we covered this year. It is a rough outline; not everything on this outline will be on the final exam, but for now, this is my starting point. When I make up the final exam, I will narrow this down for you – probably by Friday or Saturday. I will also let you know how many questions.
computer fluency
computers in your career
benefits of computers
challenges facing a digital society
government surveillance
employee surveillance
email monitoring
data mining
spam
music downloading
copyring software
negative impact of computers
loss of human interaction
loss of skills (spell checker example, for instance)
can we trust the computer
billing errors
credit report errors
database errors
software glitches
the Therac-25 (radiation machines that overdosed patients, resulting in the death of 3 of them)
are we too dependent on computers?
how far technology has come in a short period of time
technology of tomorrow
nanoscience
biomedical chip implants
artificial intelligence
RFID
biometrics
history of computers
what is a computer?
system unit
motherboard
hardware
hard drives
spindle speed
interfaces
IDE
SCSCI
SATA
memory
DRAM (main memory – RAM)
SDRAM
DDR SDRAM
RDRAM
SRAM
MRAM
VRAM
SGRAM
cache
processor
Pentium D
Pentium M
Core 2 Duo
Celeron
optical storage
CDs & DVDs
ports
USB
FireWire (IEEE 1394)
DVI
S-Video
Ethernet
bluetooth
Wi-Fi
3G
input devices
digital cameras
resolution
optical zoom vs digital zoom
output devices
monitors
CRTs and LCDs
resolution
refresh rate
dot pitch
brightness (applies to LCDs)
response time (applies to LCDs)
pritners
emerging technologies
mobile computing
cell phones
SAR
cell phone viruses
3G
MP3 players
GPS
intellectual property, copyrights, Fair Use
the Internet
history & growth
technologies available on the Internet:
the Web
background; browsers; URLs; FTP
POP vs IMAP
VoIP
Blogs
Vlogs
IM
Chat rooms
Social networks
discussion of cyberbullies and online predators
Mashups
familywatchdog.us
Podcasts
Webcasts
Wikis
wikimapia.org
Newsgroups & mailing lists
E-commerce
online annoyances
spam
cookies
adware
spyware
viruses
phishing
SMiShing
Internet hoaxes
connecting to the Internet
broadband
DSL
cable
satellite
connections of the future
fiber optics
BPL
Wi-Max
Stratellites
credit, scams, identity theft
FICO
debit vs credit
encryption & surveillance
Echelon & Carnivore
cybercrime & hacking
computer malware
software distribution
commercial software
freeware
shareware
free software (open source)
public domain software
piracy
operating systems
utilities